National Ploughing Championships – Tractor Pulling Contest Included 1938
Leinster Leader, 15 January 1938
The National Ploughing Association has decided to include Tractor-Ploughing contests on a National scale in the National Ploughing Championships in the future years. On February 10th at Carlow the competition will take the form of a contest between teams of three operating Fordson, Lanz, and Allis-Chalmers Tractors. The cream of Ireland’s tractor ploughmen will handle the outfits and great interest is being taken in the proposal.
The Director of Broadcasting has agreed to relay from Carlow a portion of the proceedings in connection with the ploughing championships on Wednesday, the 9th and Thursday, the 10th February. In a plan, to be compered by Mr. J. J. Bergin, a relay of speakers will be brought to the microphone.
New System of Judging
There is no aspect of the National Ploughing Championships which receives greater attention from the Executive Committee of the National Ploughing Association than that of judging. Every precaution is taken to ensure that competitors get fair play. Last year at Greystones there were five judges operating, and they had the assistance of two clerks who kept the scores, thus leaving the judges free to concentrate on the work. Two of the judges were from the Leinster counties and two from Munster. The fifth judge was from Northern Ireland. At Carlow there will be again five judges but they will not work together. They will operate in two pairs with a clerk to each pair, and the fifth judge will act as referee. One pair of judges will not see the marks allotted by the other pair, to a particular plot. Both pairs will hand up the score sheets which will be dealt with by three results supervisors whose duty it will be to check and re-check the figures and tabulate the results. This plan is expected to work smoothly and ensure to competitors every mark they earn. This is the first time “double” judging has been undertaken.
Re-typed from The Leinster Leader by Darragh Holland.
